Enterprise Saint John Annual Report 2011
Inspiring people, ideas & investment
Grand BayBay-Westfield Quispamsis Rothesay St. Martins Saint John
Inspiring people, ideas & investment
Grand BayBay-Westfield Quispamsis Rothesay St. Martins Saint John
Enterprise Saint John
Mission To create the environment for prosperity in the Saint John Community by inspiring and supporting people, ideas and investment.
Vision Through the leadership of Enterprise Saint John and its partners, the Saint John Community will be a magnet for innovation, creativity and business investment where you can live life on your terms.
Values Visionary Excellence - We encourage connectivity and global awareness, as we incorporate the larger Community vision in all that we do. Cohesiveness - We work with Community partners to support collaboration between those with shared goals. Inclusive - We work in a cooperative way that respects a diversity of perspective and approach. Integrity - We pride ourselves in the confidentiality of our services, accuracy of our information and our trustworthiness. Client Focused - We work as a team to provide the best advice, guidance and support to our clients to help them reach their goals. Passionate - We are a team of individuals who are passionate about aiding the progression of business and the Saint John Community.
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Inspiring people, ideas & investment About Us The Greater Saint John Economic Development Agency, Inc. (Enterprise Saint John) is a not-for-profit agency, funded by the City of Saint John and the municipalities of Grand Bay-Westfield, Quispamsis, Rothesay, and St. Martins, the Province of New Brunswick and the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA). Our volunteer board is comprised of 16 people representing a broad spectrum of industry and community interests to ensure representation from key priority sectors. They are nominated by community stakeholder groups from our region. Communities represented by Enterprise Saint John
We are staffed by a team of client-focused economic and workforce development professionals who are passionate about advancing our community.
Enterprise Saint John’s mandate and core services include: • • • • •
Development and implementation of the community’s economic development strategies Workforce expansion Investment attraction Business development Entrepreneur development
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Message from the Chair As I prepare to hand over the reins as Enterprise Saint John’s volunteer Board Chair, this gives me the opportunity to reflect over the past couple of years while also looking to the future. As Chair, I was proud to have played a leadership role in the development of our region’s economic development strategy. We reached out to and heard from over 200 people across 40 organizations, and the message was clear – there is a strong sense of optimism in Saint John and equally strong support for Enterprise Saint John’s innovative approach to economic development. We like to say innovation is in our DNA, and it’s getting us noticed. In 2011 we were awarded the Chair’s Award by the Saint John Board of Trade and in early 2012, the pinnacle of achievements – Enterprise Saint John and the City of Saint John led the initiative to have our Community recognized by the Intelligent Community Forum as one of the Top Seven most Intelligent Communities on the planet. The Top Seven designation validates Saint John’s global appeal on the world stage as a place for innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship. In joining Fredericton and Moncton as three of the world’s most intelligent communities, New Brunswick’s Urban Triangle is now part of a recognized international alumni of progressive communities who embrace connectivity and the broadband economy to inspire and support people, ideas and investment. This accomplishment supports our vital partnership with Invest NB, going a long way to help attract new international businesses and encourage investment in the province – a vision we can all get behind. In 2011, Saint John’s Common Council also set out to define its spending priorities. This led to the formation of a task force to review Enterprise Saint John’s contributions to economic development in the city. The uncertainty of support from our Agency’s primary stakeholder had a number of implications – it caused staff to redirect resources to address Council questions; it impacted our ability to recruit and retain talented staff; it made it difficult to fully support partners at levels similar to previous years; and it made it a challenge to build our Community’s reputation as a welcoming place for people, innovation and investment. By June, Common Council voted to accept the task force’s recommendations and renew Enterprise Saint John’s long-term funding. The task force found that Enterprise Saint John was considered by its peers to be a model to emulate and that the Agency delivered a return on investment of more than $6.50 in 2010 and 2011 for every dollar invested. If there is one thing I would like to stress, it is the importance of collaboration, and that there is still work that needs to be done in this area. Our Federal and Provincial partners are making sweeping changes, much without the benefit of community consultations, and for the majority of our province’s Enterprise Agencies the impact will be devastating – we expect 11 of the 15 will be crippled or closed. Now is the time to work together with a renewed sense of cooperation with all levels of government and our community partners. As we move forward in 2012, I am confident Enterprise Saint John has the right strategic framework in place to ensure each of our partners can leverage the strengths of their people, the ingenuity of their ideas and the power of their investments to continue creating a vibrant and prosperous Saint John Community. Sincerely,
Tony Gogan Chair, Enterprise Saint John 3 Inspiring people, ideas & investment
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Message from the CEO We have a lot to be proud of as we look back on Enterprise Saint John’s work over the past year. This report details some significant milestones for our organization; but it only tells part of our story. At Enterprise Saint John we measure our success by how well we work together as a team with our clients and our partners to drive growth in the Saint John region. Our philosophy is simple: regional cooperation is fundamental to having a balanced approach to achieving our social, cultural, environmental and economic goals. For Enterprise Saint John that means focusing on our core services – workforce expansion, entrepreneur development and investment attraction. People, ideas and investment: these are the ingredients for success. Through The Think City initiative, in partnership with Uptown Saint John and ACOA, we have brought together Saint John’s ICT sector which has helped fuel much of Saint John’s urban renaissance, lighting up the second and third floors of our beautiful, historic buildings. We are also working with our partners at Tucker Park to develop and promote a different type of co-located health and life sciences cluster. Our city is an interconnected living lab, and we are providing support to harness the huge potential for private and public investment and research. We also continue to provide business support services to our Community’s energy and advanced manufacturing sectors. Over the past number of years, significant investment has occurred in people, innovation and infrastructure, making Saint John a centre of expertise for these key sectors. Our skilled labour has been an important contributor to the innovations taking place here at home. We also provide education and training to entrepreneurs in the arts, culture, entertainment and tourism sectors. Combined with our broadband accessibility, Saint John continues to be a playground for innovators. I was also part of the senior staff steering committee that guided the development of Plan SJ, the City’s new municipal plan. It places an emphasis on urban core renewal, mixed-use neighbourhoods and support for environmental and cultural initiatives. Just the recipe we need to help build a vibrant and diversified economy and workforce. We are working with educational partners to address skills gap by introducing students to the wide array of jobs available in Saint John. We teamed up with employers to identify and recruit skilled workers and strengthen company human resource efforts through labour market research reports, workforce requirement analyses, targeted recruitment campaigns and industry-specific job fairs. The Business Immigrant Mentorship Program continued to provide business assistance to newcomers and we also supported young and creative entrepreneurs through our Emerging Entrepreneurs program. These are the things which are making Saint John a magnet for innovation, creativity and business investment. It is an exciting time for Saint John and Enterprise Saint John is proud to be part of this dynamic team. Sincerely,
Steve Carson CEO, Enterprise Saint John 4 Inspiring people, ideas & investment
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Investment Attraction In 2011, Saint John worked strategically with its new partner, Invest NB, to increase Investment Attraction efforts in the region. Invest NB is guided by a private sector board of directors and is focused on promoting New Brunswick as an attractive location for business investment. With its team of investment officers, it identifies companies with headquarters outside of New Brunswick that might be interested in establishing or expanding operations to the Province. Enterprise Saint John’s partnership role is to support Invest NB in their Investment Attraction efforts and to ensure Saint John is well-positioned for this investment. This includes a focus on lead generation, hosting prospective investment clients, developing our priority sectors, and providing accurate and timely information to support requests from site selectors and interested investors. Enterprise Saint John was the first community in New Brunswick to host CEO Robert MacLeod and his team of investment officers to Saint John. In December, 2011, the Invest NB team toured the community and learned about Saint John’s value proposition for investment attraction. Enterprise Saint John also presented Invest NB with a painting of the Saint John cityscape that now sits proudly in their main boardroom. When potential investors meet with Invest NB they are looking at Saint John. As the largest urban centre in New Brunswick, Saint John has a diverse economy and skilled workforce that is attractive to investors. It is a 7/24 community with accessible products and services all the time. Saint John has geographic advantages with its convenient access to key North American markets such as Boston, New York, and Montreal - all within a day’s drive. The region also has direct rail connections to distribution hubs in both the United States and Canada and the largest deep water seaport in the province of New Brunswick with bulk, break bulk, and container service. It also has an uncongested airport with connections around the world. From a professional services position, Saint John is New Brunswick’s Centre of Excellence with the largest cluster of financial and legal professionals in the province. Companies recognize the value of investing in Saint John and are interested in exploring opportunities. In 2011 Enterprise Saint John worked with a number of business delegations from North America, the Middle East and Asia to explore investment opportunities in the region. These investments included new companies and also existing corporations looking at expanding their operations. Enterprise Saint John hosted 48 investor clients, and saw three new clients locate in the region: Pivotal Payments, VAS (Think5) and Atlantic Potash. The priority sectors for the Saint John community are: ICT Energy Advanced Manufacturing Tourism Health & Life Sciences Emerging sectors include: Mining Financial Services
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Entrepreneur Development Anyone considering starting their own business has a lot of decisions to make. In 2011 Enterprise Saint John staff worked with new entrepreneurs to give them the advice they needed to get started and we helped existing entrepreneurs determine their short and long-term needs for business growth. Some of the advice we offer includes: • How to write a business plan • Applying for grants, loans and tax credit programs • Focus groups to help entrepreneurs determine customer needs • Where to get business, legal and financial services • Human resource development and training for small business In 2011 Enterprise Saint john Staff met with 800 entrepreneur development clients and helped launch 28 new businesses. Emerging Entrepreneurs The Emerging Entrepreneurs program works with young people between the ages of 15 and 35 to promote entrepreneurship as a viable career option and to support young people as they start and grow their businesses. The program offers ongoing training for existing business owners and competitions such as the popular business pitch competition. Emerging Entrepreneurs also works with high school entrepreneurship teachers. One of the highlights of the program is the campus markets where students develop businesses and sell products to their classmates for the day. Students can win prizes in a variety of categories such as best product, and best sales technique. The emerging entrepreneurs program has been in existence for 9 years. The coordinators worked with 1,600 participants in 2011. Business Immigrant Mentorship Program Enterprise Saint John continued to support immigrants interested in launching entrepreneurial endeavours in this community through the Business Immigrant Mentorship Program. The objectives of this program are to help enhance retention and integration of immigrant entrepreneurs into our communities by helping them succeed in their business ventures. The program offers business immigrants an opportunity to participate in a mentor-mentee relationship where experienced professionals / members of the local business community (mentor) are matched with immigrant entrepreneurs (mentee). Those who participated in the program had the opportunity to meet with, learn from, and engage in dialogue with established local business people. The benefits of this program are twofold: newcomers are given the opportunity to gain first-hand knowledge of the processes involved with setting up a business, establishing a professional network, and integrating into the local business community. Also, mentors have the opportunity to gain professional and cultural insights and knowledge of best practices of other parts of the world from the mentees with whom they are matched.
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Workforce Development Enterprise Saint John's workforce development team strives to address opportunities and issues that arise for local employers in the areas of retention, recruitment, repatriation, enhanced participation, immigration and human resources capacity. Strong partnerships are leveraged with local stakeholders, provincial and federal government departments and our five regional municipalities to strengthen our resources and deliver results. Retention The year 2011, marked the beginning of a significant transition in the Saint John labour market as the dominant baby boomer population began to retire. It is expected that the ramifications of this labour exodus will be felt particularly in Saint John's energy and advanced manufacturing sector (TEAMS) as the skilled trades’ workers are much greyer than other occupations. Given that over 20% of Saint John's labour force is linked directly to the energy and advanced manufacturing sector, Enterprise Saint John launched a sector engagement initiative in December, 2011 called TEAMS in order to counter the effects of this massive exit from the labour landscape over the next decade. Over 75 local industry stakeholders including organized labour, training institutions and business owners attended a TEAMS Workforce Summit called "Shaping Tomorrow's TEAMS" on December 7th, 2011. Given the aging workforce, our most valuable asset is our youth. Enterprise Saint John's workforce retention efforts support cooperative education initiatives, high school career fairs that give students insight into the local job market. Other youth focused initiatives include: a sponsorship and support for the Saint John Board of Trade's, ‘Unlimited Possibilities’, an information session luncheon held as part of ‘Bring Your Kids to Work’ day and a partnership with the Wage Gap Initiative which delivers four skills networking dinners across New Brunswick for young women to help them overcome barriers in pursuing non-traditional career choices. Recruitment This past year, Enterprise Saint John worked directly with local employers to identify and recruit skilled workers for the contact centre, primary resources, and information technology industries. In one case, Enterprise Saint John partnered with a primary resources employer to deliver 2 job fairs attended by over 500 local residents. It resulted in 82 people securing long term jobs in the primary resources sector. Immigration In 2011, Enterprise Saint John partnered with the Immigration Branch of the NB Dept. of Post-secondary, Training and Labour (PETL), three times to provide international recruitment information seminars to local Information Technology and Health Services employers. Last year, two local IT companies travelled to the United Kingdom on recruitment missions. Repatriation Enterprise Saint John maintains a web presence with "Saint John Life on Your Terms", a website devoted to providing up-todate Saint John regional information about the advantages of living in our region and its cost benefits. On a monthly basis, Enterprise Saint John responds to 'cost of living' requests from individuals considering a move to the region which is a feature of the website. Local employers also tap into to this resource to showcase our community to individuals they are trying to recruit from other Canadian jurisdictions to the region.
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Workforce Development Enhanced Participation To address issues of underemployment and skills development, Enterprise Saint John continues to partner with Vibrant Communities, the Saint John Learning Exchange, the Saint John Community Load Fund, the Saint John Multicultural & Newcomers Resource Centre, the Urban Core Support Network and the provincial department of Post-Secondary Education, Training and Labour to deliver the Catch the Wave to Employment program and the Job Bus Fair. Since 2009, 10 Catch the Wave Workshops have been held with over 404 participants. Human Resources Capacity Small to medium sized businesses are key drivers in Saint John's economy and many lack access to human resources expertise. In 2011, local employers had the opportunity to attend seven employer information sessions which ranged from Human Resources topics like the "The Right Fit" to "Workplace Wellness". As well, over 300 human resource managers receive our bimonthly e-newsletters that provide recent labour market analysis and local workforce news and events. To date over 10,000 e-letters have been sent. Enterprise Saint John's workforce team is working hard to ensure that local employers are able to source the right skills at the right time.
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Community Development Intelligent Communities Forum Enterprise Saint John Saint John, in partnership with the City of Saint John, led the initiative which resulted in our city being named one of the world's Top7 Intelligent Communities for 2012 by the Intelligent Communities Forum, a New York-based organization dedicated to economic and social development in communities around the world. The designation recognizes how Saint John has transformed from an industrial city to an Intelligent Community through a culture of innovation, creativity and business investment. This distinction comes after being named a 2012 Smart21 high tech hot spot by the ICF in October 2011. The Think City Information & Communications Technology (ICT) strength is a common thread to enabling investment attraction in all of our community’s key sectors including energy, advanced manufacturing, health and life sciences and tourism. That is why Enterprise Saint John took the lead in developing The Think City – a community resource for retaining and attracting technologically-savvy innovators, entrepreneurs and forward-thinking investors. It enables individuals living and working in ICT to congregate and network using multiple social media platforms. Through Think City Ambassadors, this initiative creatively promotes Saint John’s strength in ICT and is quickly becoming fundamental to attracting talent and investment in the creative class. Visit www.TheThinkCity.com and join in the conversation through Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+. PlanSJ Throughout the 2-year process to develop PlanSJ, the City’s new municipal plan, Steve Carson, CEO of Enterprise Saint John was an active and engaged member of the PlanSJ Steering Committee. Enterprise Saint John Board members and staff also contributed to each of the 9 open houses and other community engagement sessions. Earlier in the summer, a Board committee was struck to review the near-final PlanSJ draft. Following a thorough internal review, a letter of response reflected our overall support of the Plan. Community Service Recognition from Saint John Board of Trade Enterprise Saint John was honoured to receive the Saint John Board of Trade’s Chair’s Award at the 27th Annual Outstanding Business Achievement Awards on November 30, 2011. John Warrington, Chairman of the Saint John Board of Trade credited Enterprise Saint John for playing a pivotal role in fostering economic development in our community from supporting a culture of entrepreneurship which leads to more new business starts ups and increased business investment to supporting our existing businesses through workforce development and expansion initiatives. Health & Life Sciences New Brunswick Enterprise Saint John is working with the Health + Life Sciences Steering Committee, whose members hold senior leadership positions in Horizon Health, University of New Brunswick, New Brunswick Community College, Dalhousie Medicine New Brunswick, Saint John Regional Hospital Foundation, Saint John Board of Trade, and Enterprise Saint John. There are opportunities for additional research and commercialization by capitalizing on excellent infrastructure to attract health and life science companies, research staff that supports innovation in a wide range of research areas, a centralized location with access to many other large health and life science centres in Canada and the East Coast of the United States and the opportunity to reach a large unique clinical trials population. 14 Inspiring people, ideas & investment
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Enterprise Saint John 2011 Board of Directors & Staff Board members
ExEx-officio Members
Staff
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Our Partners
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Our Partners
City of Saint John
Atlantica Energy
Town of Rothesay
Access Atlantica
Town of Quispamsis
Human Development Council
Town of Grand Bay-Westfield
Vibrant Communities
Village of St. Martins
Saint John Multicultural & Newcomers Resource Centre
Province of New Brunswick
Saint John Y Settlement Services
Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency
University of New Brunswick Saint John
Invest NB
New Brunswick Community College
Industry Canada
School District 8
Saint John Board of Trade
School District 6
Uptown Saint John
l’Association Régionale de la Communauté francophone
Discover Saint John
Hospitality Saint John
Saint John Waterfront Development
Saint John Hotel Association
Port of Saint John
Horizon Health Network
Saint John Airport
Saint John Community Arts Board
Propel ICT
Atlantic Coastal Action Program
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Financial Statements
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Inspiring people, ideas & investment
40 King Street Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada E2L 1G3 Telephone: (506)658-2877 Toll-Free: 1-800-561-2877 Fax: (506) 658-2872 Email: info@enterprisesj.com
www.enterprisesj.com
Inspiring people, ideas & investment
Grand BayBay-Westfield Quispamsis Rothesay St. Martins Saint John